TV: Meyers off to slow start as ‘Late Night’ host

Amy Poehler and Vice President Joe Biden were Seth Meyers’ guests on his first “Late Night” show. (NBC/Peter Kramer)

The second half of NBC’s one-two late-night TV punch didn’t connect as immediately as the first, but it eventually landed.

Seth Meyers made his debut Monday night as the new host of NBC’s “Late Night,” taking over from the previous host who now anchors “The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon.” While Fallon seemed to find his footing almost from the moment he popped through the blue curtains of his classy new Rockefeller Center set last week, Meyers was still feeling his way around Monday until he welcomed his first guest, former “Saturday Night Live” pal Amy Poehler.

There were lots of things that didn’t work until that point, or perhaps worked a little bit the first time but not the fourth time. The monologue was a lot like a “Weekend Update,” which probably made sense on paper — remind people why they love Seth Meyers — but Meyers’ delivery was stiff. Seven or eight jokes in, he acknowledged what he called the first bomb in his new job, but in fact, the audience reaction to a few earlier jokes had already seemed forced.

The monologue went on too long, but Meyers’ wooden delivery suggested someone else when he was first hosting “Late Night”: Conan O’Brien. Their voices are similarly high-pitched, their humor dry and observational, and it took Conan a while to learn to relax and grow into doing the opening monologue. Like Conan in the early days, Meyers seemed to pause too long to wait for the laugh after the punch line. When that pattern is repeated, a monologue loses its rhythm. Great comics know how to fill those pauses — Carson’s singular deadpan, Jack Benny’s eye rolls, Jay Leno’s immediate move to the next joke.

More often than not in Monday’s monologue, Meyers stood there, grinning broadly after each joke until the audience gave in the way you give in to an over-eager puppy.

From there, Meyers did Venn Diagram bits. That’s where you take two things that seem to have no relation to each other and find commonality. For example: “Snow” and “Toilet Paper.” What do they have in common? “Two things you can’t find in Sochi.” The bit limped along on rudimentary visual aids: “Toilet Paper” in one circle, “Snow” in the other. They move toward each other and reveal the punch line when they overlap.

I suspect water levels went down around the nation during that bit as viewers took bathroom breaks, time zone to time zone.

It worked better as a two-person sketch, which you could pretty much say about several things that weren’t entirely successful in Meyers’ debut.

The Venn Diagrams were kind of amusing. And then, seven or so diagrams later, they weren’t. A few minutes later, Meyers riffed on what various Olympics events must have looked like to Bob Costas when he had pink eye: A ski jump looked like vintage footage of a man trying to fly with homemade wings; the women’s bobsled looked like people pushing a stalled station wagon.

There weren’t as many of these as there were Venn Diagrams, but one was probably enough.

Meyers’ first show had so many Sochi jokes, you wondered if NBC was still pumping the PR machine for its Olympics coverage after the games had ended.

The first time the show began to show signs of life was when Meyers folded himself into the chair behind the comically small desk and told a personal story, about taking his wife for a romantic Valentine’s Day weekend get-away in Connecticut and they had a flat tire. Meyers’ reaction was to call AAA, but a guy in the diner where they’d stopped offered to change the tire. Meyer’s self-deprecating telling of the story, accompanied by a photo showing him standing in the show holding his miniature greyhound while the manly Good Samaritan changed his tire, was the moment you began to think the kid’s gonna make it.

Poehler arrived a few minutes later to raise the energy level and then Vice President Joe Biden pitched in as well. Meyers was relaxed and engaged with his guests in stark opposition to his demeanor when he was alone on the stage.

The key to Meyers’ future success may be in having him interact with others, including his band leader, another “SNL” pal, Fred Armisen, the ultimate multi-tasker who went into a loopy riff about how he’s doing a new show for the History Channel which will examine things that happened in the previous hour. Just that bit, and Armisen’s fake sneer when Poehler came out, were enough to suggest that “Late Night With Seth Meyers” needs to take advantage of the chemistry between Meyers and his band leader. Where Meyers’ default is unbridled boyish mirth, Armisen is so masterful at deadpan you almost believe he really does have a show coming on the History Channel or that he hates Poehler.

The choice of A Great Big World as the premiere show’s first musical guest wasn’t a great one, except for the fact they played at the very end of the hour and probably helped viewers get to sleep. They’re a great band, just not a band you close a show with.

So overall? A C plus. Needs improvement, but it’ll make it. The goal should be to fit the show to Meyers’ obvious strengths, not try to fit Meyers to the show’s template.